Our Daily Bread -- Image Consultants

April 30, 2015

Read: Colossians 3:1-11
Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 8-9; Luke 21:1-19

[You] have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him. —Colossians 3:10

In our media-saturated age, image consultants have become indispensable. Entertainers, athletes, politicians, and business leaders seem desperate to manage the way they are perceived in the eyes of the world. These high-priced consultants work to shape how their clients are viewed—even if sometimes there is a stark contrast between the public image and the real person inside.

In reality, what people need—what all of us need—is not an external makeover but an inner transformation. Our deepest flaws cannot be corrected cosmetically. They are directly related to who we are in heart and mind, and they reveal how far we have fallen from the image of God in which we were created. But such transformation is beyond any human ability to accomplish.

Only Christ offers us true transformation—not just a facelift or an outward adjustment. Paul said that those who have been raised to eternal life in Christ “have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him” (Col. 3:10).

New! What a tremendous word full of hope! Christ transforms us into new people in Him—people with a new heart, not just fixed up to look good on the outside. —Bill Crowder

If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. —2 Corinthians 5:17

The Spirit develops in us the clear image of Christ.

INSIGHT: The letter to the Colossians is one of four epistles referred to as Paul’s “prison letters.” Written during his first imprisonment (or house arrest) in Rome, these letters also include Ephesians, Philippians, and Philemon. All of the letters were written to churches except for the one written to Philemon, who was apparently a dear friend of Paul (Philem. 1:1,7). Paul founded the Ephesian and Philippian churches, but there is no record in the New Testament that Paul was ever in Colosse.

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